Proto Exchange is a new open online 3D printing community project – currently in the phase of looking for funding through the Indiegogo crowd-sourcing site. The idea behind the project is to gather the best and the brightest of both the 3D printing and 3D modelling worlds – to work as competing teams for random commissions. How does this all translate into practice, then? A potential customer would approach the community with a need for, say, new 3D printed high heels with certain specs. In the next phase modellers and producers would pitch their approaches to the customer, who could then choose the providers they considered most suitable for their needs. And of course pay up – the full amount and credit to the actual producers.
Watch the pledge video below.
The key benefits of this process can be clearly identified for all parties – the customer would theoretically have access to a global community with a universal toolbox to fulfill his/her every imaginable wish. Also the chosen end-service providers – 3D modellers and 3D printing producers – would have a lion’s share, 100%, of the money the customer is willing to spend.
Proto Exchange is then initially clearly going after 3D artists and modellers, who haven’t been satisfied with the percentages received from current 3D printing and designing companies, but also consumers who might have been disappointed at the current selections, prices and delivery times provided by the already established 3DP service companies.
Could this be something that will take off and become the de facto service model for all 3D printing players wanting to operate in the B2C market in the future? Proto Exchange is aiming to concretize this vision – a quite utopian one as well, I have to add – and it requires building an extensive global network of 3D printing and modelling enthusiasts from scratch, whilst maintaining strict quality and delivery criteria them. Challenging concept, but interesting in any case!
To check out the other specs of the project – hit the source link below.
Source: IndieGoGO
